Beginings

When I was a young eighteen-year-old going to college for the first time I had a complex—this complex was something like being bi-polar.  I took turns being very overly confident in my maturity and capability as a newly independent adult, and being completely terrified out of my mind at being away from home.

In high school I was one of those dorky, nerdy, quiet kids who studied a lot, had about a total of two friends, and was very uninvolved in popular activities like watching sports games.  To make up for my social awkwardness though, I was very smart.  I graduated from high school at 17 with a high school diploma AND an Associates of Science.  —So of course I felt very secure in my academic prowess.  And, as most teenagers think, if they are good at one thing they will be good at everything.  I was ready to take on the world!



Then again . . . moving away from home was like pulling teeth.  I moved out the night (10pm) before classes started because there wasn't any more time to procrastinate.  I don't know what I would have done if my family didn't live about thirty minutes away. . .  When I finally realized that I actually had to go move into the apartment complex I was paying to live in it was a reality check.  So, bravely, I shoved all my clothes (dresses still on hangers, shoes piled in the trunk helter-skelter) into the trunk of my car and my mother drove me over.  I went to bed dry eyed, but so excited and terrified that I was shaking. 

And my college career only got better from there.  I began making very strange habits right from the beginning.  I was somewhat of a study-aholic freak so I would set my alarm clock on my phone for 4am—in the morning!—and get up to study.  I can't tell you how many times my roommate walked out into the living room to find me asleep over my books, curled up on the couch in the early hours of the mornings.  Perhaps the strangest part of this habit was that I couldn't figure out why I was tired All The Time.

I slept on campus regularly.  I would put out a Shakespeare play or a Latin text book, pretend to read it for a few minutes, then use it as a pillow.  —I did this on purpose so that I didn't look too completely dorky falling asleep.  This way I still looked academic, I'd fallen asleep "studying."

My idea of taking a break from school was to sit on my bed and watch a movie whilst studying yet more.  I think the only real break I took from my academic achievements was dancing.  Although ballroom dance classes may still seem weird, compared to the rest of my freshman life, they seem like a very normal thing to have taken part in.

Here I would again like to emphasize what a strange freshman I made.  I went around with a puffed out chest and a superior, knowing look because  . . . technically I was a Junior.  Oh those sweet, cute little Freshman who had so little life experience!  Little did I know how very much a part of that clan I was.

Let me give you an example.  There was a convenience store very close to our apartment complex that my roommate and I would go to when we were too lazy to go to a real store.  Everything was a little more expensive, but it was close.  The store was small, I believe it had all of two or three isles, most of which had things like cold cereal and spam loaded up on them.

On one of our excursions to the convenience store my roommate and I got our purchase, went up to the one check-out desk, and proceeded to wait in line.  While we waited we whispered stupid inconsequential things to each other and giggled—just like normal silly freshman girls.  When we finally got the the desk the cashier looked up at us and asked if we were together.

Most people would have nodded, seeing as we probably only had one gallon of milk between us (and he obviously was talking about checking-out that milk), but I decided to take our joking to the next level.

I took a step closer to the cashier, rose my eyebrows and said, "We're together—but we're not together."  The people behind us laughed at my stupidity, but the clerk only stared. . . which really wouldn't have been that bad.  He did check us out and I doubt he would have remembered us had I not reminded him who we were every time we went to the store for the rest of the year.  Every time we went to the store I would duck behind my roommate and make her peer through the glass door (which was right by the check-out).  If the clerk was there I would run into the store and dash behind an isle as fast as I could while whispering loudly to her to ask if he'd seen me . . .   Yes, I don't think he ever forgot the strange little freshman girl that I was.

 Thus was the beginning of a fantastic, strange, and complicated Freshman year at college as a confident party who still got butter and milk from her mother instead of buying it and told people in her classes she was a junior so they'd know how mature she was.